HILL, (DR) GEORGE, an
eminent leader of the church of Scotland, and principal of St Mary’s
college, St Andrews, was born in that city, in the month of June, 1750.
His father, the Rev. John Hill, was one of the ministers
of St Andrews; and he went through his whole course of education in the
university there. The elements of education he received very early,
after which he was sent to the grammar school, then taught by Mr Dick,
who afterwards obtained a chair in the university. While he continued at
school, he made a rapid progress, and was generally at the head of his
class. At the age of nine years, he exhibited so much precocity of
talent as to compose a sermon, superior in his father’s opinion to many
sermons he had heard from the pulpit; and the late countess of Buchan
was so much pleased with it, that she requested it might be dedicated to
her, and carried it to London with her, with the intention of having it
printed. The intention, however, without any loss to the world we
presume, was never brought into act. He entered upon his academical
course in the eleventh year of his age, and in all the different classes
maintained a decided superiority. His tasks he performed always with
ease; and he was highly respected by all the professors under whom he
studied. At fourteen years of age, he had completed his philosophical
course, and was made a master of arts; and, having determined to devote
himself to the church, entered upon the study of theology in his
fifteenth year. During the second session of his theology, the earl of
Kinnoul, having been appointed chancellor of the university of St
Andrews, gave for the encouragement of learners, a number of prizes, to
be bestowed on the most deserving in the various classes. These prizes
his lordship distributed to the successful candidates with his own hand;
and young Hill, having gained one of them, though he had to contend with
many that were greatly his seniors, attracted the particular notice of
his lordship, who from that moment took a warm interest in his success
in life, giving him directions for his conduct, and aid for the
prosecution of his schemes, with the warmth of a parent rather than the
cold and stately formality of a patron. During his college vacations, he
was in the habit of visiting frequently at Temple, his uncle, Dr
M’Cormick, the biographer of Carstairs, by whom he was introduced to the
metropolitan of the Scottish church, principal Robertson, and by the
principal he was recommended as tutor to the eldest son of Pryce
Campbell, M. P., and at that time one of the lords of the treasury. In
consequence of this appointment, he repaired to London in November,
1767, not having completed his seventeenth year. Such a series of
fortunate incidents occurs in the lives of few individuals. "Educated,"
says his biographer, "in the genuine principles of whiggism, he
considered the great design of government to be the promotion of the
liberty and the happiness of the people;" but in the close of the very
same paragraph this writer introduces the subject of his panegyric
saying to his mother, "as I have seen nothing but mobbing and the bad
effects of faction since I came to England, I am very moderate, and
think it the duty of an honest man to support almost any ministry." Mr
Hill was, indeed, a whig of a somewhat odd kind; the man whom he most
admired was lord North, and the objects of his aversion and his
vituperation were the American colonists, Messrs Beckford, Wilkes, and
the other members of the opposition in the house of commons.
Mr Hill, while at St
Andrews, had been an ambitious member of those associations generally
formed at colleges for the purpose of exercising the talent of speech,
and he was not long in London till he found his way into the Robin Hood
Debating Society, where he even then consulted his interest by defending
the measures of administration. His account of this society gives no
very high idea of its members. "Last night I went to the Robin Hood
Society and was very highly entertained there. We had speakers of all
kinds, shoemakers, weavers, and quakers, whose constant topic was the
dearness of provisions. There were one or two who spoke very comically,
and with a great deal of humour. But what surprised me much, I heard one
of the easiest and most masterly speakers that ever I heard in my life.
His dress was rather shabby, but he is a constant attendant and by long
practice has greatly improved. I spoke once or twice, and had the honour
of being listened to with great attention, which is a compliment in a
society of this kind, which is made up of people of all descriptions. It
sits on Mondays from eight to ten. A ticket costs six-pence, for which
you get a well lighted room and as much porter and lemonade as you
choose to drink. There is a subject fixed, and if that fail, the
president gives another. I shall be a constant attendant, not only as it
is one of the highest entertainments, but as the best substitute for the
select clubs which I have left." – "I carried," he says in another
letter to his mother, "my pupil to the Robin Hood Society, along with Mr
Brodie, Mr Campbell’s parochial clergyman at Calder, who was on a visit
to London. I made a splendid oration, which had the honour of a loud
clap, and was very much approved by Mr Brodie. It is a fine exercise for
oratorical talents." On another occasion Mr Hill thus expresses himself:
"I am obliged to you for your observations on the knowledge of mankind.
The true secret certainly for passing through life with comfort, and
especially to a person in my situation, is to study the tempers of those
about him and to accommodate himself to them. I don’t know whether I am
possessed of this secret, or whether there is something remarkable in
the persons with whom I converse, but I have found every body with whom
I have had any connexion since I came to England or Wales, exceedingly
agreeable. From all I have met with politeness and attention, and, from
many, particular marks of favour and kindness. I may be defective in
penetration and sagacity, and in judging of character, but I am sure I
am pliable enough, more than I think sometimes quite right. I can laugh
or be grave, talk nonsense, or politics, or philosophy, just as it suits
my company, and can submit to any mortification to please those with
whom I converse. I cannot flatter; but I can listen with attention, and
seem pleased with every thing that any body says. By arts like these,
which have, perhaps, a little meanness in them, but are so convenient
that one does not choose to lay them aside, I have had the good luck to
be a favourite in most places." This at eighteen, except perhaps in
Scotland, will be looked upon as an amazing instance of precocious
worldly sense. In the scramble for the good things of this world, had
such a man failed, who could ever hope to succeed?
In a subsequent letter to
his mother, referring to the circumstance of a younger brother entering
upon his education, he observes, "What is the learning of any one
language, but throwing away so much time in getting by heart a parcel of
words in one language, and another parcel corresponding to the first in
another? It is an odd thing that some more rational and useful
employment cannot be found out for boys of his age, and that we should
still throw away eight or ten years in learning dead languages, after we
have spunged out of them all that is to be found. God certainly never
intended that so much of our time should be spent in learning Greek and
Latin. The period allotted to us for action is so short that we cannot
too soon begin to fit ourselves for appearing upon the stage. Mr
Campbell cannot read Greek, and he is a bad Latin scholar; yet he is a
philosopher, a divine, and a statesman, because he has improved his
natural parts by reading a great deal of English. I am, and perhaps all
my life shall continue a close student; but I hate learning. I have no
more than is absolutely necessary, and as soon as I can I shall throw
that little away." Whatever was his Latinity, Mr Campbell’s interest was
good and promised still to be better, in consequence of which Mr Hill’s
friends were instant with him to go into the church of England, where,
through the attention of Mr Campbell, he might be much better provided
for than he could be in the church of Scotland, to which,
notwithstanding, he still professed not only adherence, but a high
degree of veneration.
From this temptation he
was delivered by the death of Mr Pryce Campbell, who was cut off in the
prime of his days, and in the midst of his expectations. Mr Hill,
however, was still continued with his pupil, who was now under the
protection of his grandfather; and as great part of his estates lay in
Scotland, that his education might be corresponding to the duties which,
on that account, he might have to perform, young Campbell was sent for
two sessions to the university of Edinburgh, and that he might be under
the eye of principal Robertson, he was, along with his tutor, boarded in
the house of Mrs Syme, the principal’s sister. During these two
sessions, Mr Hill attended the divinity class and the meetings of the
Speculative Society, where he acquired considerable eclat from a speech
in praise of the aristocracy. He also waited on the General Assembly, in
the debates of which he took so much interest as to express his wish to
be returned to it as an elder. With Dr Robertson his intercourse was
uninterrupted, and by him he was introduced to the notice of the
principal men in and about Edinburgh. By his uncle, Dr M’Cormick, he was
introduced at Arniston house, and in that family (Dundas) latterly found
his most efficient patrons. While he was thus swelling the train of rank
and fashion, it was his fortune to meet for the first time, dining at
general Abercrombie’s, with the celebrated David Hume, of whom he thus
wrote immediately after: "I was very glad to be in company with a man
about whom the world has talked so much; but I was greatly surprised
with his appearance. I never saw a man whose language is more vulgar, or
whose manners are more awkward. It is no affectation of rudeness as
being a philosopher, but mere clownishness, which is very surprising in
one who has been so much in high life, and many of whose writings
display so much elegance." During all this time, the progress of his
pupil was not commensurate to the expectations of his friends, and the
expenses it occasioned; and with the approbation of his patron, lord
Kinnoul, Mr Hill resigned his charge. Mr Morton, professor of Greek in
the university of St Andrews, at this time wishing to retire on account
of the infirmities of age, Mr Hill became a candidate, was elected after
some little opposition, and on the 21st of May, 1772, was admitted joint
professor of Greek, being yet only in the twenty-second year of his age.
He now went to London with his former pupil, and visited Cambridge,
where Mr Campbell was to finish his studies; and, having received from
lord Kinnoul and Dr Robertson ample testimonials to the ability and
faithfulness with which he had discharged his duty while residing in
Edinburgh, the family parted with him, expressing their thankfulness,
their respect, and regret. Returning to Scotland, he spent some time
with his uncle, preparing for meeting with his class, which he did in
the end of the year 1772. The duties of this charge did not prevent him
from various other pursuits. In the year 1774, Mr Campbell, in order to
make the most of his parliamentary interest in the shire of Nairn, gave
to a number of his friends votes upon life-rent superiorities, and among
others conferred one upon Mr Hill, who, while at Nairn performing his
friendly office as one of Mr Campbell’s voters, nearly lost his life by
sleeping in a room that had been newly plastered. His groans, however,
happened to be heard, and a physician being in the house to give
immediate assistance, he was soon recovered. The year following, he
formed the resolution of entering the church, and having made
application to the presbytery of Haddington, with which, through his
brother-in-law Mr Murray of North Berwick, he considered himself in some
sort connected, he was by that reverend court licensed to preach the
gospel on the 3d of May, 1775. He was immediately after this employed as
assistant to principal Tullidelph in the parochial church of St
Leonard’s, which has always been united with the principalty of the
college. In this situation, he continued till the death of principal
Tullidelph in the year 1777. The same year he was offered the parish of
Coldstream by the earl of Fladdington; but he did not think it worth
accepting. The following year, on the death of Dr Baillie, professor of
theology in the college of Glasgow, principal Robertson desired him to
stand candidate for that chair; but he seems to have taken no steps for
that purpose, probably from the circumstance of his being only a
preacher, which might have operated against him in case of a well
supported candidate coming forward. The same year, probably to be ready
in case of a similar emergency, he again applied to the presbytery of
Haddington, and was by them ordained to the holy ministry. In the year
1779, through the interest of principal Robertson, and his uncle Dr
M’Cormick, he was offered one of the churches of Edinburgh, with the
prospect of a chair in the university in a short time. This also he
declined with a view to some contemplated arrangements of lord Kinnoul.
In consequence of the death of principal Morison, Dr Gillespie was
shortly after removed from the first charge in the city to the
principalty of the new college. Dr Adamson, the second minister, was
promoted to Dr Gillespie’s benefice, and Mr Hill was elected by the
town-council successor to Dr Adamson. In consequence of his holding the
professorship of Greek, Mr Hill’s induction was protested against by a
member of the presbytery of St Andrews, and the case was brought before
the General Assembly in the year 1780, which dismissed it without
ceremony, as it did also overtures on the subject from the synods of
Fife, Perth, and Stirling. Mr Hill was, accordingly, with the full
concurrence of the congregation, admitted to the church in which his
father had officiated, on the 22nd day of June, 1780. Since his
settlement at St Andrews as a professor of Greek, he had sat in the
General Assembly as an elder; he now appeared in the more weighty
character of a minister, and on the retirement of Dr Robertson became
the most important member of the house, and confessedly the leader of
the moderates.
We have already noticed
his acceptance of a life-rent superiority, by which he became a
freeholder in the county of Nairn in the year 1774. He continued to
stand on the roll of freeholders for that county till the winter of
1784, when a new election came on; but Mr Campbell, from being on the
side of the ministry, was now violent on the side of the opposition. In
this case, for Mr Hill to have given his vote to Mr Campbell’s candidate
would have been considered by the ministry as open rebellion against
their claims on the church, for which they might have selected another
leader, and have, at the same time, withdrawn every mark of their favour
from him. They might also have prosecuted him before the justiciary on a
charge of perjury, as they had already done some others in similar
circumstances. Under this complication of difficulties, Mr Hill as usual
had recourse to the earl of Kinnoul, and to his brother-in-law Mr Murray
of North Berwick. Lord Kinnoul most ingeniously gave him back his own
views; did not, as chancellor of the university think he was warranted
to allow him to desert his professional duties for the purpose merely of
giving a political vote; and stated, that though he himself could have
greatly extended his interest by such votes as Mr Hill possessed, he had
never granted one of them. A charge of perjury he admitted, might be
brought against any person who received them, and whether it might be
well founded or not, it was a charge to which, in his opinion, no
minister of the gospel should expose himself. The judgment of his
lordship we cannot but approve, though it is probable that if the
candidate had been a ministerial one, the Greek class might have been
allowed a few holidays without the smallest impropriety. Mr Murray,
while he regretted (though he no doubt knew it from the first,) that his
friend should ever have accepted such a vote, applauded his purpose of
relinquishing it, and of refusing, under all circumstances, to comply
with the requisition to attend the election. Mr Hill’s biographer
labours hard to clear him from any degree of blame in this affair, but
without effect: it carries its character full in its face, and holds up
a most important lesson to all clergymen, to beware of intermeddling in
political intrigues of any kind.
In 1787 Mr Hill was
honoured by the university with the title of D.D., and in 1788 was
appointed to succeed Dr Spens as professor of divinity in St Mary’s
college. He had been the previous year appointed dean to the order of
the thistle, a place that had been first created to gratify Dr Jardine
for his services in support of Dr Robertson, but with no stated salary;
the dean only claiming a perquisite of fifty guineas on the installation
of every new knight. During Dr Hill’s incumbency, no instalment took
place, and he of course derived no pecuniary benefit from the situation.
He had been little more than three years in the divinity chair, when the
situation of principal became vacant by the death of Dr Gillespie, and
it was by lord Melville bestowed on Dr Hill. This appointment in his
letter of thanks he considered as peculiarly valuable, as being the best
proof that lord Melville approved the mode in which he had discharged
the duties of the divinity professorship. "I will not attempt, he
continues, to express by words the gratitude which I feel; but it shall
be the study of my life to persevere as a clergyman in that line of
conduct upon which you have generously conferred repeated marks of your
approbation." This was the termination of his university preferment; but
he was shortly afterwards nominated one of his majesty’s chaplains for
Scotland, with a salary annexed; and, on the death of his uncle Dr
M’Cormick, he succeeded him as one of the deans of the chapel royal. The
deanery of the thistle already noticed was unproductive; but the above
two situations, while they added nothing to his labours, increased his
income in a material degree. In his management of the General Assembly
Dr Hill copied closely after Dr Robertson; except that the entire
satisfaction of himself and his party with the law of patronage as it
then stood, was marked by withdrawing from the yearly instructions to
the commission, the accustomed order to embrace every opportunity of
having it removed, and by still bolder attempts to do away with the form
of moderating calls for presentees and to induct them solely upon the
footing of presentations. In his progress Dr Hill certainly encountered
a more formidable opposition than Dr Robertson latterly had to contend
with. In one case, and in one only, he was completely defeated. This was
an overture from the presbytery of Jedburgh concerning the imposition of
the Test upon members of the established church of Scotland, which it
was contended was an infringement of the rights of Scotsmen, and a gross
violation of the privileges and independence of the Scottish church. In
opposition to the overture it was maintained by the moderates of the
assembly that the Test Act was a fundamental article of the treaty of
union; and Dr Hill, in particular, remarked that there were no
complaints on the subject except from one single presbytery, for was
there any ground to complain; for, to a liberal and enlightened mind it
could be no hardship to partake of the Lord’s Supper according to the
mode sanctioned by a church whose views of the nature and design of that
ordinance were the same with his own. For once the popular party gained
a triumph, and the accomplished and ingenious leader was left in a
minority. A series of resolutions moved by Sir Henry Moncrieff were
adopted, and by the unanimous voice of the assembly a committee was
appointed to follow out the spirit and purpose of these resolutions.
Care, however, was taken to render the committee of no avail, and nearly
thirty years elapsed without any thing further being done. We cannot
enlarge on Dr Hill’s administration of the affairs of the church, and it
is the less necessary that no particular change was effected under him.
Matters generally went on as usual, and the influence of political men
in biasing her decisions were, perhaps, fully more conspicuous
than under his predecessor. Of his expertness in business, and general
powers of management, the very highest sense was entertained by the
public, though differences of opinion latterly threatened to divide his
supporters.
In 1807 Dr Hill had a
severe attack, from which it was apprehended he would not recover;
contrary to all expectation he did recover, and the following year, on
the death of Dr Adamson, he was presented to the first ecclesiastical
charge in the city of St Andrews. Eight years after, namely, in 1816, we
find him as active in the General Assembly as at any former period of
his life. Shortly after this time, however, he was attacked with slight
shocks of apoplexy, which impaired his speech, and unfitted him for his
accustomed exercises. He was no more heard in the assembly house; but he
continued to preach occasionally to his own congregation till the year
1819, when he was laid aside from all public duty. He died on the 19th
of December that year, in the seventieth year of his age, and
thirty-ninth of his ministry.
Dr Hill married in 1782,
Miss Scott, daughter to Mr Scott, a citizen of Edinburgh, who had chosen
St Andrews as his place of retirement in his old age, after he had given
up business. By this lady, who survived him, Dr Hill had a large family,
several of whom are yet alive. His eldest son is Dr Alexander Hill,
professor of divinity in the university of Glasgow. In a life of
principal Hill, it would be unpardonable to pass over his various
publications, some of which possess high excellence. We cannot, however,
afford room for criticism, and shall merely notice them in a general
way. Single sermons seem to have been his first publications, though
they are mentioned by his biographer in a very indistinct manner. One of
these, preached before the sons of the clergy, seems to have been sent
to the bishop of London, whose commendation it received. Another, from
the text, "Happy art thou, O Israel; who is like unto thee, O people
saved by the Lord?" was published in the year 1792, as a sedative to the
popular excitement produced by the French revolution. The sermon was an
unmeasured panegyric on the existing order of things in Great Britain,
and had, for a short time, an immense popularity. "I believe it will be
agreeable to you," writes his bookseller, "to inform you that I have had
success with respect to your sermon, beyond my most sanguine
imagination. I have written a hundred letters upon the subject, and have
got all the capital manufacturers in Scotland to enter into my idea. I
have printed off ten thousand copies of the coarse, and one thousand
copies of the fine. I have got letters of thanks from many capital
persons, with proper compliments to you. * * I congratulate you upon the
extensive circulation of the sermon, for never was such a number of a
sermon sold in this country before, and I flatter myself it will, in a
great measure, answer the purpose for which it was intended." The
following year he published a third sermon, "Instructions afforded by
the present war to the people of Great Britain." In 1795, he published a
volume of sermons, which is said to have met with limited success.
Several years after, Dr Hill published "Theological Institutes,"
containing Heads of his Lectures on Divinity, a work which continues to
be highly estimated as a theological text-book; "a View of the
Constitution of the Church of Scotland;" and "Counsels respecting the
duties of the Pastoral Office." This last is an interesting and valuable
work. In 1812, he published, "Lectures, upon portions of the Old
Testament, intended to illustrate Jewish history and Scripture
characters." To this work is prefixed the following dedication: "To the
congregation which attends the author’s ministry, this specimen of a
Course of Lectures, in which he led them through the Books of the Old
Testament, is, with the most grateful sense of their kindness, and the
most affectionate wishes for their welfare, respectfully inscribed."
There is no mode of publication a minister can adopt so likely to
be useful as this. It gives a most pleasing idea of a clergyman
when he thus takes, as it were, a last farewell of his people, who
cannot fail to peruse a work bequeathed to them under such
circumstances, with peculiar interest. These lectures, we doubt not,
were regarded among his parishioners more than all his other works. Of
Dr Hill’s character the reader has been furnished with materials for
forming a judgment for himself. His precocious abilities, his talents
for adapting himself to the uses of the world, his diligence in all his
offices, and his powers of managing public business and popular
assemblies, conspire to mark him out as a very extraordinary man. It may
only be remarked that, for the most of tastes, his conduct will in
general appear too much that of a courtier. |